I think the "experts" have a lot wrong when it com

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My parents were told to put me into an instutition or group home and basicaly give up on me becuase I wasn't what a child should supposedly be like. Instead of dealing with the bullies, they wanted to have me doped up on medication and just take the bullying I guess. My parents gave up and lost all trust in mental health people and handled things themselves and took me out of school to homeschool me. I am still in high school becuase the medication they hade me on killed my brain and made it impossible for me to learn.

OMG I'm so sorry you have had to experience that.

And this was in the last decade? Jeez, I dont think they have improved much?

What sort of society do we really live in?

That sounds like a really 50s attitude to have. Good lord, I can't believe the mental health issues some of the "professionals" must have.

We live in a society run by NT sheeples who fail to examine the mental health "professionals." Elected politicians aren't the only ones who aren't held accountable. Imagine if big organizations like Autism Speaks, rehabilitation programs for addictive behaviors, psychologists/psychiatrists attempting to fix anyone who doesn't fit in with their perception of what order should be, never received payment unless they actually proved they could successfully do something constructive?!?!

It's no guess, but rather a fact that people like teachers, parents, and society in general are well capable of making kids on the spectrum feel bad and inadequate. I didn't have an early diagnosis and I am sure (for me) it was a "good" thing I didn't. My life wasn't easy because I always felt like I was doing something "wrong" since I had no knowledge about being an Aspie or that Aspergers even existed. If I had known, that would mean those in my life would also have known and that would have made my life worse, especially since my parents would have tried even harder to change me than what they already tried to do.

The effects from people in my past left me with a lot of work which only I could do to fix my life.

The best way anyone can be happy and content is to like himself or herself for who he or she is. We can change things like bad character, but we can't (and should not think we should try to) change the way our brains marvelously process information. Everyone wants to be unique, yet those of us who think differently are punished by society for doing so.

Unless we stand up for ourselves and refuse to accept the destructive image being dumped into society about what being on the autism spectrum is, the harmful side effects of NTs will continue.

Believe it or not, it was the late 80's and early 90's. The first phycologist was probably Bruno Bettehiem's reincarnation and the phycatrist who siad I would grow up to be in a group home was just a b***h with an ego bigger than the state of Texas. She was head of the phyc department at the children's hospital but someone I doubt she becuame the head by working with autistic children. She was like a walking pharmacy. "OMG, she's agressive! She needs to be put on Prozac!" was her mindset and her observations about me clearly state I was being bullied and picked on but she refused to acknoledge that might be the problem.

I feel like I deserve to not fit in at all. I just always act so awkward and weird that it's no wonder society doesn't want to accept me for who I am. I just can't manage to see my AS as anything other than a bad thing, and a curse of sorts, and I can't manage to see NTs as having a much easier time in life than I do.

My parents used to threaten to institutionalize me if I didn't "straighten up and fly right." Sometimes they'd threaten to put me in a "boarding school for children with emotional disturbance. How would you like that?" and sometimes they just threatened to "go in front of a judge and tell him you're unmanageable and we want to give you up to be a ward of the state." I think I was maybe twelve or thirteen when I finally figured out that they were just idle threats. They made a threat like that and I wanted out of their house so badly I replied, "okay, let's do that!" and they walked out of the room. And didn't turn me over to the state. And quit making threats like that because they knew it wouldn't work any more because I was so distressed to live with them that I liked the idea.

You do deserve to fit in. We all do. Its really that I dont want to 'fit in'.

I value my dignity and ethics too much to be corrupted by mainstream culture.

Be in this world but not of this world

My dad still threatens to institutionalize me (I'm 25 and he knows he can't legallly do it) when I complain about noise he's making.

Brilliant post! Thank you for putting it together.

I was lucky to find one "professional" who understood my child. He helps us not feeling completely crazy when deal with schools and "normal" people. We are soo lucky that we found this guy in Europe and now just stay away from all the "professionals" and "help" in US. Honestly, we stay away from aides, testing, IEP, the whole package.

This is my philosophy exactly.

I'd also like to say, that I don't suffer. I deal.

If the world weren't so trashed with anti-autism propaganda, an early diagnosis would be a good deal. However, as it is, you do have a point in that if kids are diagnosed too early, they will begin to see themselves as inferior because of the Autism Speaks propaganda machine.

That being said, an earlier diagnosis is probably better than a later one because a kid understands why he's different a lot sooner. If the kid is somewhat respected, everyone leaves with a much better view of autism and ASDs.

I do not think it is harsh. I have also wondered that. Why should it be harsh? If NT world is allowed to call AS a disorder, then why is it not allowed for AS to call NT a disorder? Although it causes me some internal conflict to wonder this, because I am not sure if I am classifiable as NT or AS. I took self-evaluation tests that put me very close to Asperger, but not entirely. The reason I didn't get an AS score is because, although I show many AS qualities, I have a great skill at interpreting what other people are feeling, without verbal confirmation. Although I am not sure what I am, I do think the NT perspective of life is more flawed. Here is an interesting site, purporting the possibility that NT is a 'disorder'. I think it is meant to be humor, but I think a lot of its observations are accurate.

http://isnt.autistics.org/

As an addition to my above message:

Do you think it is possible to have Asperger but also have one or two NT skills? (such as being skilled at reading non-verbal cues?) Considering most things in life are variety and there are no absolutes, I think there must be a great many kinds of Asperger, not just one concrete definition. I suppose that is why it is called a 'spectrum'.

Was this something you were always able to do naturally, or was it something you learned to do? I do believe people with AS can develop certain skills, or find ways to compensate. Otherwise, I couldn´t really say....

In my case, when I first read about AS, I was confused. The first thing I saw was a website about AS in children, and it described me, as a child, perfectly!! !! Except for ONE thing: at the end, it was written that people with AS are "lacking in imagination". Well, as I am a very artistic person and pride myself on my imagination, I figured I couldn´t have AS. So I left it, and left the whole idea, thinking I couldn´t have it if I were creative. Of course, eventually I came back to it again- in every other way, it was spot on- and started researching. In fact, one of my first threads on WP was about AS and imagination. When I take the AQ test, I do score in the autistic section, but I get "NT points" for most of the questions about imagination. But I have read about, or know, or have heard of many autistic people with imagination....so where do these stereotypes come from???